Brexit - People's Vote NOW.

Seriously, you have just literally lost your argument. There has been next to nothing I have used in my posts that have been Brexit supporting narrative. I could've argument immigration, but no doubt you have a remain soundbite to counter that. I could've mentioned the NHS, remain soundbite incoming. I could have mentioned the billions we pay the EU, [insert remain soundbite here] I could've went even further and been totally Xenophobic and said our grandfathers and great grandfathers didn't fight 2 World wars for us to just hand it to Germany on a plate....But I didn't, I used next to no Leave/Brexiter arguments. In fact pretty much all of what you said I agree with. I understand the benefit of being a member of the EU as it is today.

Yet you used every single one of Remains! 0 independent thought...Such a disappointment :/ You couldn't even combat my 1 single argument. That's OK because it isn't the first time I've had it and the last 2 times was with people who are actively involved politically with the campaign. The had no argument either, because none exists. As I said I didn't follow the leave/remain narratives at all, even leading up to the Referendum. I went and looked at academic papers and reports both for and against as well as about 500 pages of the EU Treaty and formed my decision from this.

Can I ask a question or two? Do you genuinely see yourself as European? And would not bother you at all if ended up in an United States of Europe?

Since we're asking for questions to be answered, could you answer mine? Where are your trade partners? Where are your labor pools? I've asked this of Brexit supporters before, and while they all claim to know the answer, none of them will share it with me.

If you don't read mainstream media, how do you know that what I've been saying is reported in the mainstream media...?

Doesn't mean i'm not aware

@Jennifer1984 Said You don't do social media, and yet here you are on a discussion forum being very much active. Discussion forums are social media, you know.

You knew exactly what I meant, but so there is no ambiguity. I mean Facebook and Twitter. TFS hardly counts as it's had the same 10 diehard members for the last 5 years

@Jennifer1984 Said Adopting a lofty arrogance isn't clever when it's so glaringly obvious that it's a false position.

It's only a false position because you don't agree with it.

@Jennifer1984 Said So, I disappoint you..? Oh dear. How patronising is that..?

Not you personally because I don't know you but your argument does or your use of exact remain narrative, like a sheep.

@Jennifer1984 Said Then you resort to infantile cat-calling and personalising the issue. "poster child for remain". Child...? Really...? You're the one behaving like a child with cheap, snidey comments like that.

You know fine well it's a well known and used saying and doesn't mean i see you personally as a child. You're just being petty. If you want "poster woman for remain" To me that sounds even more condescending.

As for my quoting matters that have appeared in the mainstream press, since when was that an illegitimate practice in discussion..?

The fact that I agree with comments that have been reported in the press doesn't invalidate those arguments. A lot of the comments I've made have been supported by people in positions to know what they're talking about.

The fact that you recognise my statements about trade deals and don't dispute them only serves to validate them further.

I don't enter into discussions as if they are a football match where goals are scored and somebody wins the argument. That's not what it's about. If you think that your cheap pot shots at me are scoring you any goals, then you really DO need to grow up.

No point scoring needed, you've lost your own argument singlehandedly

@Jennifer1984 Said I'm putting my comments out there not for your sole benefit you know. There is a wider audience on this forum that aren't as close to the issues as we are. There are Americans... Australians... on this forum who must surely wonder what the heck Britain is doing by tearing itself apart over this.

I suspect they don't care, they have their own circus to contend with. Why do you think none of them have really if at all posted about the damage Brexit is doing to them? What I do also suspect is that you came here and made your post and didn't expect to get the opposing response you got from anyone

@Jennifer1984 Said Come on Cole.... get back on the horse. Not so many posts back you were telling me that my posts were "intelligent" and "well thought out." You've started to whistle a different tune now and it does you no credit.

If there is anything infactual in my comments then debunk them.

But cut the personal crap out. It's not big and it's not clever.

I've already said I HAVE AGREED WITH YOUR COMMENTS, several posts back. I don't need to debunk them. Yet you have used 3 or 4 posts to tell us all what we already know and what I already agree with and used that as your argument. Your posts are well thought out and intelligently put but the argument to remain or for another so called People's Vote are still remain narrative cherry picked from the media. You brought the media up (i've been swayed by them apparently) yet i've used nothing that has been actively reported on and you've used everything that has been reported on in support of remain/2nd ref

"Actually, the Conservatives have been trying to sell of the NHS for years, but as you rightly say, it would be political suicide to do this.... until now. Many tories see Brexit as the ultimate opportunity to do this.

Oh, they won't just float it on the stock market. That would be opposed. They'll do it by stealth. Allowing foreign investment to come in under the guise of "Saving taxpayers money" and justified by "An exciting trade deal with our oldest ally and best friend".

They will then argue that the foreign investment allows a reduction in state funding and in that way chip away at it budget by budget until state spending is terminated. Once medical services are de-nationalised and the healthcare of the nation becomes dependent on market forces which put profit above care."

That's all nothing more than an unsubstantiated hypothetical view of a possible future. Actually it sounds an awful lot like what the Greens and ALP have been saying here for decades re the LNP and Medicare. Only none of what they said would happen under a LNP government re medicare has ever come to pass. Still they keep playing the same record. All they change are the dates!

As for food production.....

"The EU would not accept produce from any country that does not meet EU standards. That's the whole point of having standards. That's why they're called "standards". Because they set a standard that has to be met."
NSS. If you actually read what I posted you would know that I understand this bleedingly obvious fact.

"Once the US floods British markets with cheap poor quality food, British producers will inevitably drop their standards too because that would be the only way they could remain economically viable."
That may be true if they were only concerned with trying to compete on the domestic market. Now some companies would no doubt focus on the domestic market but others would focus on existing (and newly opened) foreign markets.

"If you're suggesting we have a dual production process, one for trade with the EU and one for other places, then that too is not economically unviable. It would cost too much and therefore prices would be unattractive."

Companies are already by necessity manufacturing goods to EU standards. If they wanted to continue to sell their products to countries where EU standards are required they wouldn't need to change anything. Just carry on. No dual process required. But there are many SMALL companies in Australia and NZ who in effect have 'dual' production processes for food and they are quite successful.

"We don't have a vast outback to rear sheep or grow food on the fertile fringes..."
Have you ever been to the outback? It's designated as arid. Not great for either wheat or sheep!

"We need to be able to trade with the EU and believe me, they're going to insist on their standards being met".
Of course they are, and rightly so.

Since we're asking for questions to be answered, could you answer mine? Where are your trade partners? Where are your labor pools? I've asked this of Brexit supporters before, and while they all claim to know the answer, none of them will share it with me.

Seriously? Do you think these people will still not want to come? Sure there will be some paperwork involved but these workers earn lots of money in the UK (yep they pay their taxes) and they send some of it home. So they will still come. We turn down 1000s of applications each year for people who may well be highly skilled because we are required to adhere to free movement within the EU so we turn down applications because we can't take every one.

Trade partners. Do you honestly think because we aren't in the EU that no one will want to trade with us? After Germany we are the largest economy in Europe. Do you really think any of them can afford not to trade with us? There is already a Q of countries ready to trade with us.

Seriously? Do you think these people will still not want to come? Sure there will be some paperwork involved but these workers earn lots of money in the UK (yep they pay their taxes) and they send some of it home. So they will still come. We turn down 1000s of applications each year for people who may well be highly skilled because we are required to adhere to free movement within the EU so we turn down applications because we can't take every one.

Right. You needed to turn down applications because you had to adhere to free movement within the EU. Free movement is very attractive for immigrants. Without it, a potential immigrant has to weigh where to go in order to give them the best chance of success. The UK will lose that fight more often than it will win it, especially if it's competing against the likes of the US and EU for labor.

Quote:

Trade partners. Do you honestly think because we aren't in the EU that no one will want to trade with us? After Germany we are the largest economy in Europe. Do you really think any of them can afford not to trade with us? There is already a Q of countries ready to trade with us.

India, the US, most of the EU, and China, at the very least can afford to not trade with you. The US also thought it had an insurmountable position in the global market where countries would be falling over themselves to trade with us so much that we could use tariffs as an incentive for renegotiation. That didn't seem to work out the way we wanted it either. You think you can succeed where the US failed? That you can successfully leverage access to your market to get what you want? I find that highly unlikely.

I suppose the real basic question is how many people and products entering the UK do so because it's a point of entry and how many do so with the intention to generate revenue in the UK itself?

I wanted this thread to help those who don't live in this country to be better informed about Brexit and perhaps learn how others see what the hell we're doing.

Sadly, it's just not happening.

I've spent far too much of my valuable time attempting to go into detail for the benefit of those who want to listen, and it's being wrecked by straw men, false arguments, and the blinkered, rote default "Project Fear" position of my own countryman and I'm not going to waste any more time on that idiot.

I'd welcome some factual evidence that Brexit might work in some way, but there simply isn't any.

I'd welcome the opportunity to discuss constructively where the country can go from here.... with all possibilities on the table.... but I just can't see it happening.

Brexit has polarised the country. We're too far apart and it's just not possible to see any meeting of minds with Brexit supporting countrymen.

I hope some of you guys from across the pond or perhaps from Down Under can see something that we're missing here.

Steris PLC, a company with a £2.9 billion annual turnover is already in the process of relocating to the Irish Republic.

Liberty Security Markets is moving it's insurance business to Luxembourg.

Astra Zeneca estimates its Brexit related costs at £40 million for duplicate drug testing requirements and to build up stockpiles.

Chubb, the world's largest publicly traded property insurance company is moving from the UK to France. It has already received permission from the French regulator and the move is expected to be completed by January.

J P Morgan and other leading US banks are to shift more than 250 billion Euro (yes, you read that right) in assets from London to Frankfurt.

Banking Group SwissQuote cancelled its expansion plans in London and has instead bought a bank in Luxembourg.

MV Celine has been christened in Ireland. It is the first of two Ro-Ro "Brexit Buster" ships that are the largest of their kind and are being built specifically to by-pass the UK and send freight directly from Ireland to Belgium and Spain.

XL Insurance - a company that writes more than £2 billion a year in insurance premiums - is moving from UK to Ireland in January.

Bank of America has spent Between $300 - $400 million to move subsidiaries from UK to Paris and Dublin.

The Department of Exiting the EU (DeExEU) has spent more than £100 million of taxpayers money on staffing costs alone since the Referendum to administer Brexit.

Jacob Rees-Mogg is among businessmen who have invested in a £15 billion hedge fund specialising in Distressed Debt, that is being set up to profit out of Brexit chaos.

It's nice to know that the man who personifies the determination of Brexiters to see their plans come to fruition, will make a profit out of the misery he and his ruthless followers are determined to force upon the nation.

Ordinary people will suffer, but not the Rees-Moggs and other Disaster Capitalists. They'll just get richer.

I've given 12 examples of how Brexit is ALREADY adversely affecting the country (and I've got plenty more at my fingertips if needed).

I challenge Cole to list 12 benefits to the country that Brexit has ALREADY delivered.

No bluster please. No straw men. No false attribution. No "Oh, but the EU is undemocratic" bullshine.

I had given up answering this post as you were right. It’s not all about you and I arguing away. You have your postition and I have mine and that’s ok. It may well look like you will win the day tho given the bleaching May got the other day and I suspect the Conservatives will be decimated come Wednesday and perhaps no longer in Government. (That’s no heartbreak as they are no friend of Scotland) so potentially a General Election to not vote in, then no doubt another referendum to not vote. I am genuinely sad and see no winners at all in this outcome. How you don’t see this as a poor week for democracy is beyond me.

I wanted this thread to help those who don't live in this country to be better informed about Brexit and perhaps learn how others see what the hell we're doing.

Sadly, it's just not happening.

I've spent far too much of my valuable time attempting to go into detail for the benefit of those who want to listen, and it's being wrecked by straw men, false arguments, and the blinkered, rote default "Project Fear" position of my own countryman and I'm not going to waste any more time on that idiot.

I'd welcome some factual evidence that Brexit might work in some way, but there simply isn't any.

I'd welcome the opportunity to discuss constructively where the country can go from here.... with all possibilities on the table.... but I just can't see it happening.

Brexit has polarised the country. We're too far apart and it's just not possible to see any meeting of minds with Brexit supporting countrymen.

I hope some of you guys from across the pond or perhaps from Down Under can see something that we're missing here.

I had given up answering this post as you were right. It’s not all about you and I arguing away. You have your postition and I have mine and that’s ok. It may well look like you will win the day tho given the bleaching May got the other day and I suspect the Conservatives will be decimated come Wednesday and perhaps no longer in Government. (That’s no heartbreak as they are no friend of Scotland) so potentially a General Election to not vote in, then no doubt another referendum to not vote. I am genuinely sad and see no winners at all in this outcome. How you don’t see this as a poor week for democracy is beyond me.

I’m out x

Sorry but this is what the rest of the world needs to see. Your nations and people are so divided on this issue. That there may never be a plan that will have a high satisfaction rate. Lots of people are going to be unhappy no matter what happens

I had given up answering this post as you were right. It’s not all about you and I arguing away. You have your postition and I have mine and that’s ok. It may well look like you will win the day tho given the bleaching May got the other day and I suspect the Conservatives will be decimated come Wednesday and perhaps no longer in Government. (That’s no heartbreak as they are no friend of Scotland) so potentially a General Election to not vote in, then no doubt another referendum to not vote. I am genuinely sad and see no winners at all in this outcome. How you don’t see this as a poor week for democracy is beyond me.

I’m out x

This has been a bloody awful week for democracy. I'm in full agreement with you there. Nobody with any regard for the rule of the people could possibly say otherwise.

The division of the country is appalling and is by no stretch of the imagination a "win" for anybody. I don't like being set against my own people. I don't like being called a traitor. Briton against Briton is a dreadful state of affairs.

Please don't think I enjoy any of this because it's the last thing I ever wanted.

But so many of us saw this coming and we tried to warn everyone. The leave campaign (not yourself, please understand I'm speaking in generalisations now) came up with this "Project Fear" slogan and flogged it for all it was worth, and with the mood in the country against migrants being what it was (and in some places, still is) those people were easily able to latch onto it and dismiss every warning without any thought.

We weren't helped by exaggerated claims made by Cameron and his baleful Chancellor, Osborne. Those claims were easily debunked and the Project Fear mantra just grew and grew. Brexiters are still using those examples now in the same way that Remainers use the big red bus lie about money for the NHS.

We're all as guilty as each other and it's painful to be a part of. But it's a fight nobody is prepared to concede.

I still think a second referendum may not happen. And even if it does, knowing the British people, enough of us might just be bloody minded enough to stick two fingers up at everything we now know and still vote to leave.

Not long ago, in our high street baker shop, I overheard a woman say to the shop assistant that if it did come to another vote she'd still vote leave just to prevent the bloody Germans from winning. "Wouldn't give 'em the satisfaction." Now, I think we'd both admit, that's not a good reason for anything. That's just cutting off your nose to spite your face. But taking up that mentality towards foreigners is a very British character trait. There are those who would do it.

Of all the options emerging, the second referendum is still an outsider. But in my opinion, it is the only way to definitively decide, once and for all. Remain would be favourite to win by a number of yardsticks, but the British people being the British people, it could still produce a leave result.

I'll say to you here and now, that if a leave vote were still to happen, I would accept it on the basis that it was voted for by a public who now know what Brexit will mean, are aware of the consequences and much better informed than before. I wouldn't like it, but I'd accept it and drop opposition. Such a vote really would be "The Will Of The People." It's not just about a vote, it's about an informed voted.

But would a second referendum that led to the cancellation of Brexit be a victory..?

No, it would not, and the cancelling of Brexit would not be a reason to gloat. There would be no "victory" involved. The only thing I would feel is relief. Relief that we had pulled back from the brink of an abyss that would affect my.... and more importantly, my child and future grandchildren's......lives.

We know there would be some civil disorder, but Aristotle once said "Anger is a short lived madness". No doubt there would be rioting and violence on the street, but that would be a knee-jerk response I believe and would soon settle when people realise that now their jobs, homes and futures are safe and swallowing the pride that came so close to coming before a certain fall, would be a price worth paying. Hopefully, magnanimity from the continent would prevail over anybody who had the temptation to rub Britain's noses in it. It's not necessary.

I think in time, confidence would return and I sincerely hope a government will rise that will address genuine British concerns over Europe and with the lessons of the last two years learned, the EU will also give a more listening ear to our issues.

I never wanted Brexit in the first place. This has been a dreadful two years. And it's still not over yet. What has happened this week has been bad. Very bad. But if it somehow leads to be the saving of the country that I would have it be, history would look back at it in generations to come as a watershed that we all learned from in the end.

It is neither my right nor my place to dictate how another person chooses to live their life. That goes both for people and for nations. If the UK wishes to play with fire then that is their prerogative. What I can't stand is all the hiding and the excuses and the rosy colored glasses.

I don't know if the UK can survive an economic fight with the EU. I truly don't. Quite frankly I don't care, but the willful arrogance of it all is laughable, personally. Brexit proponents are acting like the UK can walk into a bar fight and not have to take a single hit in order to win. Instead of preparing the UK for the coming storm, Brexiters seem perfectly content to deflect criticisms with cries of nationalism.

How is this different from the EU they hate so much, in which the needs of the whole outweigh the cries of the few? In which cries of unity drown out the concerns of the UK?

But that's democracy isn't it. When it is your own voice that is silenced, that is when the cries of injustice ring forth, but when the shoes on the other foot? No, then it is democracy working as it should.

People truly are the same the world over it seems. Everything has a cost, a price you must pay in order to undertake an action. Everyone plays this song and dance, and yet so few people realize it. Even less acknowledge it. They say it is for 'the good of the nation' or 'the good of the people'. They wrap up the concerns as 'necessary sacrifices' and chuck them into the waiting maw of 'justification' of which anything and everything is a sacrificial candidate. A way in which they can wash their hands of the matter while still enjoying the rewards, whether they be ethereal or concrete.

It is neither my right nor my place to dictate how another person chooses to live their life. That goes both for people and for nations. If the UK wishes to play with fire then that is their prerogative. What I can't stand is all the hiding and the excuses and the rosy colored glasses.

I don't know if the UK can survive an economic fight with the EU. I truly don't. Quite frankly I don't care, but the willful arrogance of it all is laughable, personally. Brexit proponents are acting like the UK can walk into a bar fight and not have to take a single hit in order to win. Instead of preparing the UK for the coming storm, Brexiters seem perfectly content to deflect criticisms with cries of nationalism.

How is this different from the EU they hate so much, in which the needs of the whole outweigh the cries of the few? In which cries of unity drown out the concerns of the UK?

But that's democracy isn't it. When it is your own voice that is silenced, that is when the cries of injustice ring forth, but when the shoes on the other foot? No, then it is democracy working as it should.

People truly are the same the world over it seems. Everything has a cost, a price you must pay in order to undertake an action. Everyone plays this song and dance, and yet so few people realize it. Even less acknowledge it. They say it is for 'the good of the nation' or 'the good of the people'. They wrap up the concerns as 'necessary sacrifices' and chuck them into the waiting maw of 'justification' of which anything and everything is a sacrificial candidate. A way in which they can wash their hands of the matter while still enjoying the rewards, whether they be ethereal or concrete.

Brexit is an ideology. It has become almost a religion for many. It has become a goal that must be achieved to the exclusion of all other considerations. The cost is unimportant. The sacrifices, whatever they may be, are justified by the fact of making it happen.

You have to understand the English... and by that I mean, that part of the United Kingdom that is England. That is the driving force behind Brexit.

We call them the "Little Englanders". They are overwhelmingly the post war generation known as "Baby Boomers". Now in their elderly years, they remember the Empire... or at least the fag end of it. They revere the days when the religion was Church of England, the faces on the street were white and a foreign accent was something only heard when they went abroad.. and that wasn't often.

The Scots, Irish and Welsh knew their place. A young man walked out of school at the age of 15, into the local factory or coal mine and he had a job for life - except for the two years national service that he would do in the army.

Women were property... chattel... required to stay at home and make sure their husband's dinner was on the table when he came home at night. He took his son to the football on Saturday afternoon while she did the weekly shop. Nothing ever changed, everything was in its place, comfortable, unchanging, and an Englishman's home was his castle.

West Indian migrants had been trickling here since the 1950's but that was alright because they were put in the slums and told to do the jobs that Englishmen didn't want to do like empty dustbins and sweep the streets. Those were jobs fit for black men, not white Englishmen.

Then came the Common Market. And things started to change.

For a start, we'd had to change our currency in 1972 to facilitate joining. We no longer spent pounds and shillings and half-crowns. A pound was now 100 pence, not 240. Things called kilos and metres and Litres started to appear on maps and tins and bottles. Black people and women started demanding their rights. The Church even dropped the requirement for a wife to "obey" her husband. Shock Horror..!!!

And then the worst thing of all. Something called "Human Rights" started appearing in the news. What was that all about..? Black people started having aspirations. The social order was falling apart.

And the finger of blame was pointed firmly at the Common Market.

In 1968, a Tory politician named Enoch Powell had made a speech warning that there would be "Rivers of Blood" if Britain joined the Common Market and black people were encouraged to come here and worse still, wanted to be treated as British. To this day, Brexiters and other racists will proclaim "Enoch was right".

The Common Market.... EEC.... EC..... EU... in all its various guises as it has progressed has tried to take Britain along with it, with the baby boomer generation kicking and screaming against every Act that brings about a little more modernisation... a little more integration.... a little more equality.

Sure, there was a referendum in 1975, but that produced a remain vote by nearly 70% because the country was in such a horrible mess at the time enough people were prepared to be willing to give the Common Market a try.

Younger people like myself have grown up thinking of ourselves as Europeans. I've never known what it was like outside, but I can read a history book and I know that I don't like what I read about the days when hotels, boarding houses and rooms to rent all had signs saying "No Pets, No Irish, No Blacks". The days when racist TV comedies had star characters calling a black actor "Sambo".... and everybody laughing. The writers would say that they intended the laughter to be aimed at the racist but that message didn't get across at the time. They laughed at the mocking and abusing of the black man.

Brexit has been driven my a number of things. The extremist nationalists of the hard right, although they are a relative minority. The capitalists who stand to gain financially out of it regardless of how many people they drive into poverty.

But mostly, Brexit has been driven by the baby boomers. The elderly generation for whom the 2016 referendum was something they'd been praying would come their way for many, many years. And they weren't going to miss the opportunity. They came out in droves. And voted.

Other elements had crept in apart from migration by this time. Concerns over a federal Europe and allegations that the EU was undemocratic. But hold on... we elect our MEP's. We send elected representatives to Brussells to represent us. The Council of Ministers are all elected politicians in their own country and are not permanent. Every country is represented on the council and every country holds the Presidency in turn. How much more democracy do the Brexiters want..?

But those of us who have grown up in peace and security... who believe in Human Rights... Who are not offended by the sight of a black face or a woman in a burka.... those of us who would be happy to work abroad because we set our horizons beyond the local factory gates, and have no objection to fellow Europeans coming to work here.... see the EU as a good thing because it enables all those things.

The Brexit vote was sharply divided across age boundaries. Overwhelmingly, the elderly - the baby boomer generation - voted for Leave whereas young people overwhelmingly voted to remain. The final result was close. 52% - 48%. That is a majority for sure, but that majority had a demographic boundary.

That demographic has shifted since 2016. The Office For National Statistics has calculated that so many of the elderly generation (who voted to leave) have since died, and so many of the young (who vote remain) have now come of voting age, that the demographic of 2016 is no longer viable.

Brexit is relying for its justification on the votes of people who are now dead.

Can we... the young people of Britain who have our lives in front of us allow those who are close to the end of theirs... drag us into an abyss against our will, that will affect us far longer than them..?

I know that we don't - and shouldn't - weight votes according to age. One man one vote is paramount.

But the shift in the demographic is surely one justification... Just one of many... that are becoming more and more imperative by the day.... for another vote..?

Want to see what a racist looks like..?

Pro Brexit poster. You can get this image on tee shirts here. We see Brexiters wearing them all the time.